Interviews

 

VELVET REVOLVER

 

Words: Rod Yates

 

“The feel, the energy of Libertad is about the eternal struggle for freedom – personal and social values.”

 

Were you to take this quote from Velvet Revolver vocalist Scott Weiland about the band’s new album, Libertad, on face value, you’d be forgiven for thinking the LA-based rockers had traded in their bottles of Jack Daniel’s for a swag of political texts and a soapbox. Thankfully, guitarist Slash is happy to put things into perspective.

 

“I wouldn’t call that my own personal mantra for the record,” he drawls. “It’s basically a good simple rock’n’roll record. But in saying that,” he adds, “it is sort of a statement about how we just want to do whatever it is we feel like doing and say whatever we feel like saying. That’s where the title becomes a little more appropriate.”

 

Though Slash may epitomise the very concept of laidback, there’s a defiance to his voice as he discusses album number two. Many had, after all, assumed that Velvet Revolver would combust in an ego-fuelled explosion within months of forming, with Weiland’s drug-past in particular held up as a potential stumbling point. The fact they’ve got this far is especially pleasing for the guitarist.

 

“It’s definitely vindicating considering what we went through dealing with the media and whatnot,” he starts. “We got tons of negative stuff from the media all along, and now we’re sort of turning around and sticking our finger in everyone’s face.”

 

Are you referring to their expectation that you’d split up before making a second album?

 

“More than expecting, actually wanting it. Just for the sake of entertainment. I don’t know, it seems to be a bit more entertaining these days to watch all the trauma.”

 

Which, admittedly, there never seems to be a shortage of in the VR camp. Indeed a recent feature in UK magazine Kerrang! saw bassist Duff McKagan explaining how the band had been through “a lot of crap” in the last 15 months. All Slash will say is that certain problems had to be fixed upon completion of their last world tour.

 

“I think we had more issues with people we worked with really. We just had a lot of things going on that were very trying, and then when the tour was over we had a lot of outside issues with different rumours that were flying around and there was a lot of Guns N’Roses stuff going on at the time, and so there were just a lot of hurdles for us to jump through before we could really feel comfortable and get that creative thing going. There were a lot of stupid obstacles that weren’t really necessary.”

 

Such as?

 

“There’s no sense in going back and picking them out individually, it’s over now.”

 

The troubles continued when the band finally reconvened last July to start working on Libertad with producer Rick Rubin. Before long the sessions were abandoned and a new producer, Brendan O’Brien, shipped in.

 

“It was a combination of things,” says Slash of the parting with Rubin. “A lot of the reason is that he just wasn’t there. And it was sort of not knowing what he was expecting from us in a way – does he want us to sit around and write for another year, two years, three years, cos he definitely has that indefinite air about him. And being the kind of rock’n’roll band we are, we can only sit around for that long.”

 

Thankfully the sessions with O’Brien went a lot smoother, with Libertad emerging a rawer album than its predecessor, Contraband.

 

“I think we were more comfortable with each other,” explains Slash of the recording. “When we did the first record that session was great and I’m really proud of the record, but we did get together and put that out all within a matter of months and so we didn’t really have that much experience with each other, we were feeling each other out. And then we did all that touring and you start to develop a synergy and just keep pushing away at it. So when we came to do this record everyone was just very relaxed.”

 

Though this may be of more interest to trivia fans than it is the guitarist, but when Libertad hits the shops this week it does so 20 years to the month since Guns N’Roses released their seminal Appetite For Destruction album.

 

“Oh, is it this month?” asks Slash. “That thought has never even occurred to me. I had no idea it’s 20 years this month.”

 

Now that you know, what do you think?

 

“It doesn’t seem that long ago, it really doesn’t.”

 

Recent press reports of Slash suggesting that the original GN’R line-up should do a few festival shows has given fans some hope that they may one day see him sharing a stage with Axl Rose again. Don’t hold your breath.

 

“You have to be very careful about saying anything to do with that particular subject,” he warns, “because it doesn’t necessarily mean that I think we should or I want to, it was like, one of those statements where that would be the easiest way to do it. But I don’t see it happening. It’s an amusing thought, considering I get asked that question at least three times a week. It was more or less, there’s a concept for you. I don’t necessarily think anything’s going to happen with it.”

 

Do you have any interest in Chinese Democracy?

 

“Yeah… I’ll be glad to hear it when it’s out.”

 

More pressing, though, is the release of Libertad and the ensuing world tour, which will bring the band to Australia early in 2008. More than two decades after crawling out of the gutters of LA, you have to wonder whether going on the road for long stretches of time is as appealing to the guitarist as it once was.

 

“Of course, it’s what keeps me doing it,” he sniggers. “Outside of the actual producing a good song and going out and touring on it, there’s really not a hell of a lot to be gotten out of it!”

 

 

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